⌨️ :: internet dating at the holidays? super cliche. except maybe not so much when you realize who's waiting 'in the red sweater' at the mall food court. (reversed!)
written for @lcfthaunted
This was a terrible idea.
There were no two ways about it. Was she out of her mind?
Sorcha checked the time on her phone again. Exactly two minutes later than it had been two minutes before, the last time she’d checked, imagine that. She let the screen go black even as she stared at the digital numbers, and did her best not to fidget with the device.
“Excuse me,” a voice over her shoulder said.
Her head snapped up and she turned towards the sound, but it was only a father trying to get past her with an oversized stroller. She stepped aside. “Of course, sorry,” she said with a small smile.
She looked at her phone again (a whole 60 seconds had gone by), mostly checking for a notification this time. Despite how well the last few weeks had been going, she still half expected him to cancel.
That train of thought only brought her back around to the fact that this might be the worst idea she’d ever had. Tapping on the ad for the app had been bad enough, but this? She sighed and unlocked her phone, opening the conversation tab of the app and scrolling back to the very beginning. Maybe rereading some of their conversation would remind her why exactly she’d thought this was a good idea in the first place.
She smiled to herself. Neither of them had been comfortable when they’d first started talking, and looking back at it now, it practically radiated off the text. She could remember how it had felt. Online dating had never really been something she thought she’d ever do. After all, most apps of the sort seemed geared only towards hooking up and, well.
She could find someone for that just fine on her own, thank you very much.
Something about the ad for this app, however, had grabbed her attention. It advertised real connections over hookup culture. Given that she’d had maybe one connection she’d actually thought was real in her entire life, it appealed to her. Something deeper than a one night stand or a short-lived friends with benefits sounded really good, actually. So she’d tapped through, installed the app, built herself a profile. The fact that they discouraged sharing photos was a new one, but she found it almost refreshing, somehow.
Put simply, she was used to being able to draw people in based on her looks. Sure, she had the intellect and the conversation skills to go along with her body and her face, but intellect and conversation skills had rarely been more than icing on the cake. In truth, the idea of trying to build any kind of connection based on nothing more than black and white text? Mildly terrifying. Not that she’d admit that, even if pressed.
She swiped through the conversation on her screen, skimming over the majority of their conversation until she landed at the plans they’d made for that day.
gildedlily21: I’ll be in the northwest end of the food court, red sweater.
mjrnchurch: I’ll keep an eye out.
So here she was. Standing there, red sweater and all, waiting for someone she’d never seen before in her life. What could possibly go wrong?
Another voice spoke behind her. “Excuse me… I’m looking for someone who calls herself gildedlily21, I’m supposed to meet her here.”
She took a breath, realizing she'd heard that voice before. She turned, looking up into a face she would never have expected. “...Wait, really?”